This invention relates to a method for the production of alcohol in high yields from cellulosic materials as the substrate.
Heretofore, production of alcohol (ethanol) has been attempted by a procedure comprising the steps of reacting a cellulase upon cellulose as the substrate to enzymatically saccharify the cellulose to glucose, and subsequently separately causing the resultant glucose to be reacted upon by an alcohol-producing microorganism to produce alcohol. According to this conventional method, the conversion of cellulose to glucose by a cellulase is low and, consequently, large amounts of unconverted cellulosic residue are obtained. Therefore, if the product of such a cellulase treatment of cellulosic materials is employed as the raw material for alcohol fermentation it is necessary to separate the glucose from said product, for example, by filtration. Thus, in addition to the drawback that the glucose concentration in the saccharified liquid is low due to the low conversion of cellulose to glucose, the production of glucose according to the conventional method includes the possibility that glucose is lost during the aforementioned separation. Consequently, low yields of alcohol are obtained by subjecting the saccharified liquid to fermentation.